Salud! Dinero! Amor!

The 1st time you sneeze, Nicas say Salud. The 2nd time its Dinero. The 3rd time its Amor. There might be more...and I sneeze a lot so I would know them by now. Usually, people just stop with Amor.

I cant even begin to explain everything i've learned in the month i've spent in Nicaland. Just know I'm learning more and more each day.

Here's 10 things I understand better about Nica Culture..

--Sometime you have to put your chicken on a leash..It might run away.

--You say adios to people you pass when walking in the street. Not hello. If you say hello, you have to stop and chat. You don't want to stop and chat with everyone..right?

--The people on the east coast tend to be darker in skin tone. If I actually spoke spanish with an awesome accent I could pretend I was from the Atlantic Coast..or if I knew creole.

--Apparently, Central America is the long lost 8th continent. or it could be that there are actually 6 continents because "The Americas" make up one entire gigantic continent. Some needs to standardize social studies/ geography/ around the world, I learned it was 7. But I guess it really depends on where you live in the world.

--Lunch is a HUGE meal. Dinner and Breakfast only serve to hold you over till the next time you can have lunch. It's kind of a big deal.

--Time is never of the essence. Nica time is very much like CP time in the US.

-- Being an Ama de Casa (Nica terminology for Housewife) is laborious not glamourous.

--Machismo is real.

--Banano, Platano, Maduro, Tostadas, and a few other things from the banana family are all staples of the Nica diet. My family eats them all the time. They still cant believe (nor understand) that I don't eat anything banana.

--Nicas are incredibly generous, humorous, and very family oriented.

Annnd a Few Things I'm still working on:

--The maximum sentence for any crime in Nicaragua is 30 years. And often, criminals receive less time than that for even the most heinous of crimes. I don't get it…

--The belief is, although your theoretically losing iron, when a women is menstruating she doesn't eat beans or she'll feel more pain.

-- 40 days after giving birth, theres a bunch of beliefs about what you can and cannot eat. I'm still trying to sort it out.

--There is no tooth fairy. Instead, you throw your baby tooth on the roof. Then, you are told that  the rats come and take your tooth away. Which actually seems like it could happen. I kinda like the tooth fairy idea better.

--Machisma. Basically, its women teaching their sons how to be Machismo...